More finished drawings and other happenings

At last the above drawing that I have worked on these last four days for various amounts of time is finished. It only took half an hour or so to complete the last bit so I started on two more but building in my line and dots style, after a short think and gathering of pens I was off.

I was listening to Young Musician of The Year on the tele, it was the brass final with some lovely players too as I was enjoying one of the young trombonists my thoughts were drifting to another young trombonist I used to play with in The Blues Collective, he was very talented and has now gone onto win two BAFTA's for script editing both I think were for working on Sean Meadow's films.

I digress whilst stimulated by the music I drew lines on this on and started almost immediately on doing some dots on it, I could feel as I was drawing some of the lines hadn't dried properly I could feel the stickiness of the ink, when that fact had eventually made a full thought impression I stopped to look, I loved the effect it had created and my wife Zoe looked at this drawing and said 'Stop'. Sometimes I do find it hard to stop once I have set out the rules, concept and process but this time I fought the urge to carry on, it was hard at first to resist the urge to continue but I did and I do agreed it does look really cute just as it is. It was made slightly easier by knowing I had another bit of slate to draw on. One thing from this drawing had got into my thought process too, which was the vertical scratch line.

So as I moved on to the next drawing I started by scratching some lines straight into the raw slate. I was very satisfied by this act for some reason. I then did the same kind of line process on it and then let it dry a little before putting on the dots and the results can be seen below.

I took quick pictures this morning before I went off to do my shift in Cafe Art, as I have said before it was the business that Zoe and I started when we came to St Ives. It has been a very interesting couple of days working in the cafe again, had some lovely visitations from folk that had found out I was in and it was nice to see some of the characters that I don't see quite so often as we are mainly up at the Barnoon Workshop these days.

After work Zoe and I had a little wander around the town distributed a few posters for May and I bought a new St Ives Sketchbook from the Mariners gallery for £6, very reasonable. I now have to get my thoughts together to see what will go into it. Now that seems to be an artist's dilemma or maybe I am just worrying about it too much.

As we listen to the Craig Charles Soul and Funk show I am thinking of my week to come and how much drawing I can fit in, I will let you know if I come to any conclusions although the next new images I post should tell part of that story......

Back in the Cafe and other musings...

Above last nights almost finished slate drawing, it should be completed later. Below is a pic of morning doing a shift in our old cafe, Cafe Art in St Ives. An interesting day bumping into old customers and them doing a double take that I was in there again. This is all due to the World Gig Rowing Championship on the Scilly Isles. I reinitiated the 'wotnot' style of drawings on the loyalty card which was fun for a few of the old customers, including 'Hot Chocolate Colin' from the Tate shop, always nice to catch up with him.

After my shift we went for an old style pint at the Rum and Crab Shack on the wharf and then home to eat and blog.

It was also nice at the cafe to catch up with Laurie who is goofing in the background of my pic here. We had a good art talk and she went through quite a bit of my latest sketch book.

Above a very small bit of art done on a fragment of sea pottery. I feel sometimes that almost everything is my sketchbook/art work, the lines between both really blur for me, plus do I draw or do I print, I guess it is both really. I need to start think of the exhibition I have with my wife Zoe Eaton in the summer the concept behind it is certainly not formed yet. These will be some of the musings that will be going on in my head as I do more drawing tonight. :)

Circles and dots and the thinking behind...

Above is the progress I have made on my latest slate drawing which the second sitting was done last night and more to do tonight.

Today has been a busy one catching up with folk, organizing meetings and generally trying to sort stuff out, whilst delivering 3 separate guitar lessons and sorting out the Workshops clay sessions.

I am really enjoying working with metallic gel pens at the moment, they work so well on stone. I know it is just another drawing phase that I am going through but I always believe it is good to work in series otherwise it would seem like a million one-offs.  

In my head at the moment I am preparing to start another whole sketchbook as one piece of work, I find this exciting and also scary as my ideas haven't really come together out of the ether yet but I am sure they will once I am faced with the stark reality of a blank sheet of paper. I do like playing the thought process game and certainly now that I am doing this so far daily blog I am trying to explain myself more clearly and I am finding that part of the process too because I do believe that visual art should have a bit of thinking behind it or otherwise it could be considered lazy or without direction. I am always happy to chat to anyone who asks me about what I do, why I do it etc etc. So if anyone wants to comment or question what I am doing I will be happy to respond.

Cheers

Slate drawing finished and another started.

Above is a new new slate drawing I completed last night. I was half watching television as I drew and I was glad I was i a sort of Zen state as all the days news came flooding in. What an idiot that Jeremy Hunt is and I would discuss this more except I am livid about it and then was distracted by the eventual Hillsborough verdict. 27 years it has taken to get this and a good thing it is to but blimey I feel sorry for all the families of the 96, what a toll it must have taken on them all. The Sun newspaper and Kelvin Mackenzie deserve all they get for some seriously bad coverage at the time but on top of that seeing the press statement, 'seriously hoping that no one from the Sun was in attendance'.

Above is the next slate drawing and should hopefully keep me calm in the stressful days.

This morning I have been up to the workshop and then I have been hot desking in town with Carl and Kate the BID people. They have been giving me a little space to help with kick starting an arts festival in this town. More about that at a later date as we have a little meeting tonight.

Cheers everyone.

More Slate and more.....

Above is my second slate drawing of the week, I showed the first one to Melanie from the UYS Gallery St. Ives and she basically told me that if I did at least three she would have them in the gallery, so I am making it happen and have started working on the third.

Today I have opened the workshop for our pottery throwing class and then visited Cafe Art for a coffee and updated the website, trying to put in all the summer events we have so far, trying to get a better lead time so therefore more chance to book.

Talking of books I have just started reading 'Karate-Ka' by our friend Joel Reeves and the first three chapters have lead me in nicely, I will read on some more.

Many things are happening at the moment and it is all a bit like juggling but with more than three balls, my art is giving me solace. The world seems to be going quietly mental and I am now happier and happier that we are in what I call The Penwith Bubble. We are far away enough from lots of hectic world stuff, not that things don't happen down here but people see more gentle and accommodating.

Last evening I attended the AGM of Sky High Arts, the CIC company that I am a director of.....

More work to do today.... A guitar lesson and drawing....

Cheers!

Drop in and Draw and .....

I don't often show my work from our drop in and draw class at Barnoon because my main focus is abstract work but here is a pineapple i drew this morning, quite stylized so I though I would show it just to prove I do draw 'things'.

I have been becoming increasingly disappointed with art on television and also the standard of our television in general, however I really did enjoy seeing Forbidden Planet last night. The soundtrack is still so modern considering when it was made, I believe 1956.

Above is a small drawing that took quite a while to do and below is a small dot intervention I did on the condensation on the inside of a window, you can probably tell it is me....

Sort blog today due to time constraints. Cheers all.

Slate Drawing, workshop maintenance etc

Here is a drawing I did last night on a piece of slate using a metallic silver sharpie a normal sharpie and a metallic gel pen. I have more of this slate and may well do a few more soon. The slate was donated by our friend Tree from Sky High Arts. The thought of drawing on slate must have come from the 'shed' visit yesterday, see previous blog.

Today has involved getting up with a little hangover, well it was Saturday night last night. Coffee and workshop discussions in the back garden, with a nice drop of sunshine and birdsong. We then went up to Barnoon Workshop to clean up a bit after yesterdays soap making and then we primed some boards, some to make mosaics on and others for extra signage.

Last evening I also spent a couple of hours working on the 'big one' again, first time I had touched it in nearly a week and it is heartening that I really seemed to have turned a corner with it now and I do feel like finishing is getting a lot closer, I just have to find time to work on it a bit more regularly.

I am sitting in Weatherspoon's in St Ives writing this with a not great coffee and cheesy chips

Cheers

Soap making, new drawing and a shed party.

Above is my new drawing completed last night and cam phoned this morning. After doing the pic we had to get up to the workshop to get ready and host a soap making workshop for a hen party for eleven, which turned out to be fun.

I also did a small art drop whilst picking up water for the said workshop so here are the ones I left. I normally don't leave more than one together but these were quite small and an uneven pair seemed to work for me.

After the workshop was over my wife Zoe made one final soap as a gift because we were off to a shed party at our friends Colin and Gazelle. When we arrived it was in full flow, the wine flowed and the nibbles were good and here is a pic of some of the folk that we encountered and by the way nice shed. Below is the interior, however I did forget to take a pic of the slate cladding outside.

We left the party after visiting the 'top' shed and below is the cool view from up there, after that a quick shop in town for supplies and then of up the hill back home. Now a bit tired but feeling like I have caught some good rays in the spring sun...

Cheers

New Drawing and meor.

Above is a new drawing completed the night before last, quite a subtle one for me just using two colours, the thick end of my new letraset pro marker and a stabilo fine point for the dots.

Above is the half finished reverse side drawing of the on at the top of the page, I will do further work on this later I am sure.

I am averaging 3 or 4 hours drawing a day at the moment it is a good way of relaxing for me helps fight against the stresses of this modern world and my slight lack of 'project' money. I need to get some new works framed and ready for sale but with out a windfall or some sales it makes for slow progress, a very St Ives predicament.

Above is a quick snap of the Porthmeor Beach that I took today while my wife gathered sea weed for drying for our soap making workshop tomorrow at Barnoon. I see why I am drawn to images like this as the seem to be full of dots, well in my mind anyway.

Below is a view of the nearly deserted beach, what a visual prize fro living here that it is just down the road. There have been quite a few sightings of dolphins this week but sadly I have missed them all. Hopefully will catch some again soon, I did see a pod of 20 or more at the end of September last year and it really does raise the spirits. A wonderful beast the dolphin.

At lunch my wife and I walked into town made a quick food grab of a spicy vege sausage roll each from the Cornish Bakery on Fore Street, they are very nice indeed and a sensible price too, we ate them as we went on to visit 'The Cornish Art Fair' at the Guildhall. It was very well set out but at the risk of offending anybody taking part it was spectacularly pedestrian, uninspiring, lack lustre. I didn't hate it all mind one or two things stuck out as 'art' but in a town with such a rich art history it was a poor apology for what art is and lacked almost anything contemporary. Vision is needed for art and it did lack in this fair, I really wanted to support it.

Cheers see you tomorrow!

Wood drawings, Prince and stuff.

Above and below are some of the first drawings I did on wood or as I sometimes refer to it as 'thick paper', well that term is just for my on amusement which also reminds me it is about time I made some new handmade paper to draw on.

Below is the last of the three I did of rough squares of ply wood and actually had a title that I remember which was pendulum. So it was a mini series that I might continue with in the future, I always reserve the right to do so.

Below is the first drawing that I sold at my first exhibition in St Ives, which was called The Theory Of Everything Part Two which was at Cafe Art. I still really love this drawing it was drawn on a slice of wood that was found in Tahidy Woods.

Today I have only done a small bit of drawing, so more to come later. I have also done a guitar lesson, it should have been two but one got cancelled. I returned from my lesson and had dinner, a lovely middle eastern dish with vegetables and cous cous. Then started work on an invoice for the junior school for two of my pupils and then onto my blog. It is a bit later than usual but hey I managed it.

Tomorrow I will be showing of at least one new drawing from my book. I have all the art in my head just got to have more time to do it all.

I also found out when I got home that Prince had died. A very influential figure in the world of music that sometimes I really enjoyed but I didn't get caught up in the hysteria that some of my friends did having said that, Alphabet Street, Kiss, Sign o' The times and a few others were mighty fine tunes. Having said that he was a quality act RIP The Purple One. It seems to be a bad year for celebrity deaths.

I hope we have a happier day tomorrow.

Cheers

Art Drop, Ship down the road, New drawings.

Above are the little art pieces I 'dropped' around St Ives today mainly in the Barnoon area, I did that because I spent a couple of hours up there drawing waiting for some fired clay from the workshops to be delivered. The wind was really getting up so I think rough weather to come. Ever since we moved to St Ives I have been so much more in touch with the elements and I like it, better than city life.

This afternoon I have been working at home with my wife on the Barnoon Workshop website trying to get further in the future with it than we ever have.

Above is one of the drawings I finished off last night, this pic doesn't quite show it off at it's best but it does show it is finished.

Above is the reverse of the first with other metallic dots on top of the dots.

Found this in my book this morning only half remember doing it at the Drop in and Draw on Monday. It must be my idea of adder skin....

I am off to a guitar lesson soon and then will be scampering back home to get in the warm the temperature seems to be dropping again although still sunny. Below is a pic I too 'down the hill' on my way to the Island Centre.

More dots on the way later :)

UYS Gallery, other blog readers and sea pottery

Above is a small intervention I made in the UYS Gallery while I was manning it today, some of these have been part of an art drop today and two I left in the gallery for Melanie to find. All these 'finds' were found after I went and opened up Barnoon Workshop for our Pot Throwing session today that was taken by Angela Roberts our pot thrower and half of the RAAR Emporium in the Drill Hall Stives.
Below is the area where I found the sea pottery on the way to opening up the gallery. It was a beautiful morning and already warm.

I got to the gallery at 10:45 and opened up, managed to get some nice music on and had a quick coffee before I started drawing. At lunch time my wife Zoe came in with lunch and we did some planning for the next set of events at Barnoon as my wife left a fellow St Ives blogger Rob Donovan popped in for a chat, which turned out to be very affable mentioning such topics as our previous teaching experiences, music and a lot about St Ives and life. I had never met Rob before but that didn't seem to get in the way of our conversation, nice fella.

A little while after Rob had left our old friend Lauren Sebastian popped in for a chat too, she had just been into town to get some prints done, they looked pretty good. Lauren also had the opportunity to look at mine and my wife's work in the gallery and was really interested in all the pieces we had there.

I then had to shut the gallery up and got up to Barnoon to give a guitar lesson then back down town for shopping then home to eat a lovely curry that had been cooked and later I am off out to de-rig a trapeze for Sky High Arts at the Island center.... blimey, sounds like a full day to me. What do artist's do all day?

Bye...

Adder in Vodka, art drop, Blackstar/Starman and UYS Gallery

I have to report an interesting start to the week, I attended the regular 'Drop In And Draw' session at Barnoon Workshop St Ives this morning and added to the still life to draw we had this brought in by Anne, her husband hand found this dead adder up at Hawkes Point, probably killed by a seagull, he had brought it home and pickled it in vodka. I have never had a day start like this before....

Above is one of the sea pottery fragments that I left around St Ives at lunch time, those of you who know the area will probably know where it is placed.

Above is how far I have now got with my Blackstar/Starman drawing as I have probably said before it is a bit of a cathartic reaction to the death of David Bowie. It has taken quite a while to progress this far, it is ll those little dots that have taken the time. I feel that it is a lot more than half way through now and I am on the downward slope of getting it to completion, the number of dots on each pass will be getting less and less and will now make me happier with each circuit to be done.

Tomorrow I will be in The UYS Gallery, Tregenna Hill, St Ives from about 10-30 ish until about 15-45 ish if any one wants to pop in for a chat or question me about my art, I will be very happy to see you and hopefully I will get to meet fellow blogger Rob Donovan http://robdonovan.blogspot.co.uk

Here is a quick view of Barnoon Workshop where I spend quite a bit of my time. It is a lovely chilled spot even with the Tate St Ives extension works next to us. www.barnoonworkshop.co.uk

Cheers

Little insight

Above is what resulted from a second sitting on this one, most of it was done whilst watching the concluding two parts of the gritty Swedish drama Blue Eyes, however I don't think the drawing was influenced by the violence and dodgy dealing that went on. I really enjoyed the different facets of this and many other nordic noir dramas that seemed to have proliferated on our screens over the past few years. I have been nicely surprised at how we as a nation has taken to them, on the other hand what other quality television is being made in the UK. We have a woeful amount of new art programs they seem at an all time low. Is our culture slowly sinking in these times of austerity?

Above is the reverse of the top drawing and deserves further work but I know not what yet....

Above is the front cover of a sketchbook I finished a while ago, the whole book works as a whole in my mind and maybe I should put it on the market as a whole. It looks like I will be drawing in UYS Gallery on Tuesday so if anyone wants to pop in while I am there for a chat or to buy anything you are welcome. I will update with times in tomorrow's blog.

Bye for now.

Unfinished, now finished, new finished, new unfinished etc

Ok so above wasn't finished yesterday and has changed a little bit mainly by starting to draw on the one below, so it was using my bleeding narrative to draw on the reverse of the paper to get the desired effect.. If it was to be shown it would have to be framed with double sided glass.

Below is a new one started and for once my thinking hasn't gone much beyond what you see so I will post as I continue to work on ti.

Some artist essentials, pens and coffee and a flat surface to work on. This is my 50th blog and it has become quite a part of my daily routine and is helping think and express my thought about what I do how I do it and how it kind of protects me from getting to angry about all the horrible things that are going on the outside world oafs in government everywhere not helping the common people and the mass problems we have in this world through not gaining a true perspective on our one little world.
I do wish peace, safety and dignity to all. Whoops letting the outside world in again.... Cheers Bobby x

finished/unfinished

Above a drawing from a little while ago it just caught my eye as I was looking through a whole finished book and so here it is. I like it, it war drawn using letraset pro markers, berol wather colour pens and a uni pin fine liner.

Above a random experiment that I was quite happy with, it was me thinking things through if I remember rightly.

Finished/unfinished? I like the minimalism of this one but I am not sure whether I have done enough to it yet or if I can resist the temptation to draw on it more. Time will tell....

Mixed bag of a day today, it started with an 11 O'clock guitar lesson that went very well teacher and student seemed happy. I then sorted some fired pottery out with Michaela Wrigley and returned some unfired stuff to be fired next.

More drawing to do later......

More art today.....

Above is a drawing I finished last night, the ink bled through the page so well that the drawing below is the reverse image added to, I the started another.

Above and below are two drops that haven't been found yet that I left out the day before although most others seem to have gone, to where I have no idea.

This morning I had to get around town with more posters for the workshop and also manage to have a little chat with Joseph Clarke from the Anima Mundi Gallery in St Ives, formally the Millenium and also with Michael Gacca at the Belgrave gallery. Since then I have done a guitar lesson and the weather has changed for the worse it was beautiful this morning and is now rainy and cold. One more guitar lesson to do then out for Quiz Night at the Western Hotel, wish us luck we always lose.